obsession

From listening to athletes, business owners, and creatives talk about improving their craft and being “great,” a common theme is obsession. Not just simple discipline and dedication but doing it for the love of the “game” whatever game that is. Webster defines obsession as

a persistent disturbing preoccupation with an often unreasonable idea or feeling.

This feels aligned with how I think about it. I think of it as being so consumed by an idea / or thing that you cannot physically or mentally shake it. It’s an urge to act that is almost crippling to your own being almost like an addiction.

When I reflect on my past obsessions, the last one I had which lasted for most of my later childhood. That was the video game, League of Legends.

As early as I can remember playing, it occupied my brain space for almost every waking hour. Coming home from school, I would log in and grind games for hours, honing in my skills to climb the online rankings. Was I any good? Sort of at the time but definitely not enough to become a pro or rank in the top .01 % of players. But I did love it. I vividly remember the feeling of ranking up and winning local tournaments and always wanting to get that feeling as often as possible.

Perhaps it was also a coincidence that around the same time I started playing, I also made the conscious decision to not pursue competitive golf after 10 years of intense time and energy on. The blood, sweat, and tears spent on golf was now poured into this video game.

I write this because I often miss that feeling of working towards being fully immersed at a craft and feeling proud to share it. Work scratches that itch a tiny bit but it’s difficult to frame what I do as a craft. My role is not coding or design and more of an amalgamation of operations and engineering. It is somewhat of a craft in that it’s important and occasionally creative but not quite in the building sense. I do feel like I’m improving, but the progress doesn’t feel tangible.

So maybe it’s time to make space for that kind of obsession again. Not necessarily to compete or win, but just to work on something I can pour myself into. Something that feels like mine and simply doing it for the love of the game.